


Mortally Challenged

by GeniaTheParadox



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, So much angst, Suicidal Thoughts, so damn angsty i apologise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-09
Packaged: 2018-04-19 22:07:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4762775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeniaTheParadox/pseuds/GeniaTheParadox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's difficult to explain to someone who isn't a twin. It's not like just having another brother. It's so much more than that. It's like two halves of one person, different but the same.</p>
<p>(reposting oldies because I have no laptop)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mortally Challenged

**Author's Note:**

> I'd totally forgotten I'd written this, but I found it deep in the depths of my ff.net account and... wow. This is so sad. Brace yourselves.

It's difficult to explain to someone who isn't a twin. It's not like having a brother. I've got loads of those and I love them all, of course – even Percy, although that's pretty much only because he's my brother and I have to. It's different with a twin. It's not just another brother. It's more like being two halves of the same person. That's what Fred is to me...  _was_  to me.

I never minded having my name last. It was always Fred and George, said in one breath like we were one person, and I didn't mind that I was second. I'm about a minute and a half younger, so it makes sense. And George and Fred doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does it? He did everything before me. We started walking on the same day, but he did it a few minutes before me. We said our first words on the same day, but he did it a few minutes before me. That's just the way it was always going to go. We'd do everything together, only a few minutes apart.

Mum always said I was the slightly quieter twin, although only  _slightly_. She said that when we were little I was always perfectly sweet and gentle on the rare occasions when I wasn't with Fred. But, obviously, those occasions were very rare. We were always together, always  _Fred and George_ – the jokers, the pranksters, the Troublemakers-in-Chief. We brought out the best and the worst in each other.

We were good at making jokes out of everything, making light of every situation. Like when I lost my ear. Obviously it was traumatic at the time. It hurt like hell for a start. I could have bled to death, or fallen off the back of the broom. It could have been so much worse. But it wasn't. So it was easy for me and Fred to laugh about it. It was easy to make jokes about how Mum would finally be able to tell us apart, and how I could never wear sunglasses, and how girls loved battle scars but a missing ear might be pushing it.

I can imagine Fred making jokes about this too. He'd probably say that he preferred to be called 'the mortally-challenged' or something. But I just can't bring myself to laugh this away. It was easy to make jokes when Fred was here, but without him... it's like I can't think properly anymore. When we were inventing our Skiving Snackboxes it was easy because we were doing it all together. They probably wouldn't have turned out half as good if it was just me inventing by myself. I need him to think properly... breath properly... live properly. Without him I feel kind of lost.

I spent several days in almost constant tears, locked in our old bedroom at home. Mum wouldn't let me go back to the flat above the shop because she didn't want me to be alone, but instead I just shut myself away. I was so scared that I'd remind everyone of Fred and make them all feel even worse. I didn't want to make Mum cry even more just by being a constant reminder of the son she'd lost. But Mum made me come out and be with the family. She said that me shutting myself away made her feel like she'd lost both her twins. So we sat in the living room and she held me without saying a word. I felt like a little kid again, having her hold me and stroke my hair. I've never cried so hard before in my entire life.

So now we're planning the funeral. It's weird, because me and Fred had our whole lives planned out, including this. We'd get married on the same day, and then we'd have kids and get rich with the joke shop and grow old and die on the same day, Fred a minute and a half before me, of course. And then we'd have our funerals on the same day. Everyone would have to wear bright coloured clothes, whatever they were comfortable in, and they'd all tell funny anecdotes about everything we got up to in our long lives, and there'd be music and dancing and fireworks. It would be a real party, and no one would be allowed to cry or wear black. In our heads there was no chance that one of us would go long before the other. Everything we'd do would be together.

But now he's gone, gone where I can't follow him. Although on those first few tearful days I wanted to follow. Merlin knows I wanted to be exactly where he was. I wanted to end it all just so that everything would stop hurting. I wanted that other half for me back and just ending it seemed like the only option. But then I thought about Mum and Dad. I thought about Ginny and Ron, about Charlie and Bill and even Percy. But most of all I thought about Fred.

Fred would think it was a total cop out to just do myself in after a week of being alone. He'd say I was being a wimp.  _You can look after yourself, Georgie. It's not like I left on purpose. If I had the choice I'd be there with you, celebrating the end of You-Know-Who like the rest of the world. But I didn't have a choice and now I'm pushing up daises. You have a choice, twiny. I miss you and everything, I miss you loads, and I hate seeing you so cut up. But I'm not letting you take the easy way out. You're going to live, whether you like it or not. There's no point in us both being mortally-challenged, is there? Suck it up, Forge._

He made a good point, even if it was just in my head. I couldn't just quit now. I had to keep on living, no matter how lonely I felt or how much it hurt. Okay, so we were always going to be Gred and Forge and he was always going to be the other half of me, but that didn't mean that I couldn't live my own life. I could be just George. I could carry on by myself.

I love all my family – my parents and my brothers and my baby sister – but there's no one in the world that I love more than my twin. We didn't say to each other much, but it was always there. Like when we were really little and one of us had a nightmare and we'd crawl into the other's bed just to feel a bit safer. We both knew exactly how much we meant to each other without ever having to say it. Although sometimes I wish I could've done. I wish I could've told him how much I love him and said goodbye. But somehow I think he already knows.

It's difficult to explain to someone who isn't a twin. It's not like just having another brother. It's so much more than that. It's like two halves of one person, different but the same. And even when one of those halves is missing the other half has to keep going, even though that half will never really be a whole person. That half has to keep going. I have to keep going. For Fred's sake. For my other half.

_Wow, Georgie, that was beautiful. I had no idea you were so deep. I'm welling up over here. Not to get too mushy on you or anything, mate, but I love you too. I might be mortally-challenged, but that doesn't mean I won't always be here, twiny. Now go get as many fireworks as you get lay your hands on so you can send me off with a bang. It's time to but the 'fun' back in funeral!_


End file.
